U.S.A. CANCELS DEAL
No Torpedo Boats
For Britain
TRANSFER FOUND TO BE ILLEGAL (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) (Received June 25, 10.30 p.m.) WASHINGTON, June 24. The President (Mr Franklin D. Roosevelt) ordered Mr Charles Edison, retiring Secretary to the Navy, to cancel the transaction for the transfer of 20 torpedo boats to Britain as a result of the Attorney-General’s opinion that the transfer would be illegal in the light of the 1917 statute specifically prohibiting sending from American jurisdiction “any vessel built as a vessel of war with any intent or under any agreement that such vessel shall be delivered to a belligerent nation.” Mr Stephen Early, secretary to the President, said the State Department was considering several hundred unofficial suggestions that the United States should take possession of the French Navy, merchant marine or possessions in the western hemisphere as part payment of the war debt. He emphasized that the suggestions were chiefly in letters and telegrams from private citizens. He gave no indication that the Government was proposing to act on them.
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Bibliographic details
Southland Times, Issue 24162, 26 June 1940, Page 5
Word Count
174U.S.A. CANCELS DEAL Southland Times, Issue 24162, 26 June 1940, Page 5
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